"As for the "conspiracy theories" regarding 9/11, they are clearly referring to the ideas that no planes were flown in to buildings, that George Bush organized the attacks and that the buildings were brought down by controlled demolitions."
Jeez.. I expect better from Bill Kelly than this. The former two claims are, in order, a meme established by 'debunkers' with ugly aims to tar the 9/11 investigative movement as idiots, and a similarly weakly argued assertion made by very few, if any, of the 9/11 researchers I've come across. Phillip Adams, a major Australian radio host on the Government funded ABC radio down here, spent half an hour or more some years back slamming 'conspiracy theorist nutters' after evidently being fed the assertion that those same researchers believe 'no planes hit the buildings'. "Absolute bullshit!" cried Adams to his audience of over a million. A couple of years later, when local activist John Bursill tried to discuss the matter at a local Greens party political meeting, someone in the crowd cried out "They believe no planes hit the building!". The dismissive roar led to Bursill being shouted down and ignored for the rest of the session. That noted, I've read pretty much all the major books of 9/11 conspiracy research from the works of Griffin to (more estimable) works like Peter Dale Scott's ROAD TO 9/11, Nafeez Ahmed's THE WAR ON TRUTH, Ian Henshall's 9/11 THE NEW EVIDENCE and a good several others, along with a decade's worth of content from the best of the investigative blogs, and the 'no planes' theory appears in exactly none of them. In the majority of those same books, Bush is depicted in a manner which likely fits closely with the viewpoint of those who dismiss all the conspiracy theories on this topic - as a blustering, easily guided puppet doing what he is told, with little if any foreknowledge of the events as they happen. If Bill Kelly thinks that 9/11 researchers as a whole 'clearly' argue that no planes were flown into buildings or that Bush somehow masterminded the conspiracy, he's either done little primary research or he's being exposed to too many unrepresentative folk poisoning the debate over at the Education Forum - or, quite possibly, he's used his disagreements with some of Jim Fetzer's JFK and related conspiracy arguments to colour his view of the 9/11 topic in light of Fetzer's assertions about it. Apologies if this is contradicted by other evidence but that comment from Bill - a researcher who I put in the very top tier of authorities on the JFK assassination - makes this seem to be the case.
As for the 'controlled demolitions' subject, forget the subject of the Twin Towers collapse for a moment and concentrate on WTC7, where Barry Jennings and a co-worker witnessed explosions from within, where a countdown was heard prior to collapse, where firefighters remarked on camera prior to the collapse that the building was about to be blown up, where two different corporate news reporters reported the collapse of the building prior to it doing so, where NIST offered more than a half-dozen conflicting rationales for its collapse before being forced to acknowledge a free-fall collapse as part of the building's descent, where Kevin Ryan was ousted from his job for refusing to go along with a distorted engineering analysis, and where demolitions experts on camera have laughed at the notion that it was anything other than an assisted collapse prior to being advised that the clip shown was from 9/11. I find it telling that the bulk of FOI clips on the subject that were released under duress some months back all feature footage of the collapse that is damning to the official story. Bill and others are welcome to argue against the demolition theory, but the blanket dismissal of researchers as being loons for contemplating the subject at all is unworthy of anyone who bothers to watch this clip -
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IO1ps1mzU8o
released under the above mentioned FOI request, where three firefighters discuss on camera experiencing successive explosions in the buildings prior to the collapse. Likewise, the end of Jon Elinoff's lengthy CORE OF CORRUPTION documentary, (a film covering much else besides the subject of collapsing buildings) has a good 30 minutes of footage showing maybe 50 or more reporters and witnesses caught on camera discussing the presence of explosives on the day. I remember that Doug Horne vented his spleen at the end of one of his volumes of JFK research on the topic, equating 9/11 truth researchers with nuts who believed in the tooth fairy, whilst neglecting to note that a good number of the JFK researchers he quoted with approval in his own work have written articles or entire books questioning the official story of 9/11.
Longtime researcher Jon Gold responded to a VANITY FAIR excerpt from the Summers book with the following -
"There are a few things that should be pointed out. It states that "no hard evidence would emerge that Pakistan had any foreknowledge of the 9/11 attacks." However, there are a couple of reports that say otherwise...
PAKISTANI MILITARY BRASS KNEW IN ADVANCE THAT 9/11 WOULD TAKE PLACE (quoting 2006 story from newkerala.com, reprinted on the below forum)
http://www.yourbbsucks.com/forum/showpos...ostcount=1
THE REAL CULPRIT OF 9/11 (quoting 2004 Washington Times story that begins, 'On the eve of the publication of its report, the 9/11 Commission was given a stunning document from Pakistan, claiming that Pakistani intelligence officers knew in advance of the 9/11 attacks.')
http://www.yourbbsucks.com/forum/showpos...ostcount=1
(quoting Gold further) - ..Indeed, listen to what [TERROR TIMELINE author] Paul Thompson had to say on 7/22/2005 at the National Press Club circa Senator McKinney's Congressional Briefing on 9/11 (further details evidence from various 9/11 Commissioners covering Pakistan's involvement):
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FBrM7zyXT4E
(Gold continues) - This article mentions Prince Bandar, but doesn't mention the allegation that his wife, Princess Haifa bint Faisal, was connected to some of the money sent to the two hijackers in San Diego.
http://www.historycommons.org/context.js...99princess
It also mentions Lt. General Mahmood Ahmed without mentioning the allegation that he ordered Ahmed Omar Saeed Sheikh to wire transfer $100k to Mohammad Atta.
(Link to footnoted History Commons article beginning ISI DIRECTOR REPLACED AT US URGING; ROLE IN FUNDING 9/11 PLOT IS ONE EXPLANATION)
http://www.historycommons.org/context.js...odreplaced
Gold also put up a Youtube video with C-Span footage and news report excerpts further detailing the Pakistani element, including pertinent comments from State Dept rep Richard Boucher.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vKM4oJcmjro
(Gold continues) - It should be noted that a 'Memorandum for the Record' from the 9/11 Commission was recently discovered that said, "there is absolutely no evidence Atta received a wire transfer from the Pakistani ISI," but there are major redactions prior to that statement, and after it. Also, there is no mention of Lt. General Mahmood Ahmed or Ahmed Omar Saeed Sheikh. I have never seen a statement from any official explain why the allegations of the $100k wire transfer are wrong or unsubstantiated."
Throw out the above 9/11 conspiracy theorising in its entirety and you're still left with the signs of pre-9/11 complicity between Al-Qaeda mercenaries and US intelligence as a covert proxy tool for the west in various wars and terrorist events as exhaustively documented by Nafeez Ahmed, Ali Mohammed's protected status as a US intel-linked Al-Qaeda trainer involved in assisting both the original WTC bombing and later 9/11 attacks on that building (covered by Peter Dale Scott in several long articles), stonewalling regarding stock trades on the day, detailed evidence of official, systematic squelching of pre-attack data sharing between the FBI and CIA (outlined over 400 pages or more in Kevin Fenton's just released DISCONNECTING THE DOTS), the Able Danger data-mining exercise being stonewalled and pilloried when it suggested (after the event) detailed pre-attack surveillance of the hijackers, the Israeli art-spy / Dominic Suter Urban Moving Systems Mossad cover agency with cheering Israelis on the day filming the event, and probably a hundred other damning facts mentioned neither above nor (I'm hazarding a guess) in the Summers book. Possibly Summers does 'explain' away the additional elements of the 9/11 story that have little if anything to do with Saudi Arabia in his book about Saudi involvement, but I doubt it. I'm open to the notion that the Summers book contains new, useful research covering the Saudi angle which is best viewed in conjunction with the other info noted above. That said, and I'm possibly preaching to the converted, if the Summers book 'explains away' the thousands of pages of damning articles I've read on this subject to date I'll eat someone's Fedora felt hat.